Richard Rohr explores our human and religious temptation to hide qualities we think of as negative or “less than” in order to make ourselves seem better than we are.
Entering the spiritual search for truth and for ourselves through the so-called negative, dealing squarely with what is—in ourselves, in others, or in the world around us—takes all elitism (its most common temptation) out of spirituality. It makes arrogant religion largely impossible and reveals any violent or self-aggrandizing religion as an oxymoron (although sadly that has not been widely recognized). In this upside-down frame, the quickest ticket to heaven, enlightenment, or salvation is unworthiness itself, or at least a willingness to face our own smallness and incapacity. Our conscious need for mercy is our only real boarding pass. The ego doesn’t like that very much, but the soul fully understands.
In different ways, we humans falsely divide the world into the pure and impure, the totally good and the totally bad, the perfect and imperfect. It begins with dualistic thinking and then never manages to get beyond it. Such a total split or clean division is never true in actual experience. We all know that reality is a lot more mixed and “disordered” than that; so, in order to continue to see things in such a false and binary way, we really have to close down. That is the hallmark of immature religion. It demands denial, splitting, and mental pretense. It moves from the first false assumption of purity or perfection toward an entire ethical code, a priesthood of some sort, and various rituals and taboos that keep us on the side of the seeming pure, positive, or perfect—as if that were even possible.
I mean this next point kindly: Organized religion is almost structurally certain to create hypocrites (the word literally means “actors”), those who try to appear to be pure and good, or at least better than others. Jesus uses the word at least ten times in Matthew’s Gospel alone! We are unconsciously trained to want to look good, to seek moral high ground, and to point out the “speck” in other people’s eyes while ignoring the “log” in our own (Matthew 7:3–5). None of us lives up to all our spoken ideals, but we have to pretend we do in order to feel good about ourselves and to get others of our chosen group to respect us.
Honest self-knowledge, shadow work, therapy, and tools like the Enneagram are sometimes dismissed with hostility by many fervent believers, perhaps because they are afraid of or hiding something. They disdain this work as “mere psychology.” If so, then the desert fathers and mothers, the writers of the Philokalia, Thomas Aquinas, and Teresa of Ávila were already into “mere psychology,” as was Jesus. Without a very clear struggle with our shadow self and some form of humble and honest confession of our imperfections, none of us can or will face our own hypocrisy.
| MLK: The False God of Nationalism (Pt. 1) |
 Click Here for AudioI used to do a fair amount of premarital counseling. After a few meetings with the engaged couple, I always asked them an important diagnostic question: “Tell me something you don’t like about your fiancé.” Healthy, mature couples could answer the question with some specificity. Couples that couldn’t answer the question meaningfully, or who responded with, “Nothing at all! S/he is absolutely perfect,” set off warning lights on my pastoral dashboard. It indicated they were in love with their idealized perceptions of each other rather than real, fallible human beings.The way people relate to their country is very similar. A healthy love of country is mature enough to celebrate what is admirable about one’s homeland, its history, culture, and people, but also recognize its imperfections and failures. In other words, it’s a love rooted in reality rather than fantasy. This is also the difference between godly patriotism and idolatrous nationalism. Just as scripture calls us to honor our father and mother but not affirm or emulate their sins, true patriotism honors our country without ignoring or endorsing its transgressions. It’s a love based in truth rather than myth. Nationalism, by contrast, is a juvenile love of country that ignores or denies any shortcomings. It’s infatuated with an imaginary and infallible country. Where nationalism declares, “America—love it or leave it!” godly patriotism says, “America—love it by improving it.”In his 1953 sermon, which is strikingly prophetic for our times, Martin Luther King Jr. identified the characteristics of this mythological and unholy love of country:“We are all familiar with the creed of this new religion. It affirms that each nation is an absolute sovereign unit acknowledging no control save its own independent will. The watchword of this new religion is: ‘My country right or wrong.’ This new religion has its familiar prophets and preachers. In Germany it was preached by Hitler. In Italy it was preached by Mussolini. And in America it is being preached by the McCarthy’s and the Jenners, the advocators of white supremacy, and the America first movements.” Healthy patriotism is admirable as it motivates us to serve and sacrifice for our neighbors. But Christian love, like our Lord’s, is never blind. “My country right or wrong” is not a pledge a follower of Jesus can ever make. Our Lord’s love rejoices when we do what is right, and his love brings correction—and even discipline—when we are wrong. If we are to avoid the false god of nationalism, our love for our country ought to reflect our heavenly Father’s love for us by celebrating what is good and seeking to change and improve what is not. Christians, more than any others, should demonstrate a mature, honest love for their country, and never participate in myths that seek to hide its sins. DAILY SCRIPTURE HEBREWS 12:3–11 1 TIMOTHY 2:1–2 WEEKLY PRAYER. Hilary of Poitiers (310 – 367) Keep us, O Lord, from the vain strive of words, and grant to us a constant profession of the truth. Preserve us in the faith, true and undefiled; so that we may ever hold fast that which we professed when we were baptized into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit; that we may have you for our Father, that we may abide in your Son, and in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. |
